Home Forums Long Island & Eastern New York Soccer Message Boards Roll Away The Stone Soccer News Long Island Soccer Club Announced as Member of New Girls Academy

Long Island Soccer Club is pleased today to announce its membership in the newly created Girls Academy for the upcoming 2020/21 season.

Development Academy clubs across the country have banded together to establish a new platform for its players following U.S. Soccer ending operations of the U.S. Development Academy on April 15. This unification of DA clubs has led to the creation of the Girls Academy.

With more than 65 former DA and National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) clubs, along with all eight former U.S. Soccer DA Northeast clubs including Long Island Soccer Club, committed to the new Girls Academy, this platform provides players with an opportunity to continue their growth on and off the field as they progress to the highest levels of elite soccer.

“LISC players and all players in the Development Academy were faced with uncertainty after U.S. Soccer ceased operations of the Development Academy, but many clubs took the initiative to unify in order to create this new platform and seamless transition for our players to continue their development,” said Meghan Frey, Long Island Soccer Club Girls’ Academy Director. “We look forward to the 2020/21 season in the Girls Academy and beyond.”

The biggest change in the Girls Academy is the flexibility allowing players to participate in high school soccer depending on individual club guidelines. New substitution rules will encourage clubs to better utilize their talent pools, especially when showcasing players for college scouts.

Girls Academy clubs will be broken into six conferences for the 2020/21 season: Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Mid-America, Southeast, Frontier, and Southwest. The Academy plans to have cross-conference matches, college showcases and a national championship series during its inaugural season as conferences and clubs create a schedule based on guidelines and recommendations from health and government officials during and after this pandemic.

“The new Girls Academy will uphold the highest standards and principles, all in alignment with what we do at Long Island Soccer Club,” said Gary Book, Long Island SC Academy Director. “The aim is to continue to provide the opportunity for our players to have consistent competition over 10 months.

“LISC will stay the course and make sure that true development combined with quality competition is the overarching objective to prepare our players for pathways best suited for their individual futures.”Long Island Soccer Club will offer seven age groups in the new Girls Academy for the 2020/21 season: Under-12 Pre-Academy, U-13, U-14, U-15, U-16 U-17, and U-18/19. Interested players should register for upcoming LISC Girls Academy tryouts HERE. For more information about Long Island SC, email info@longislandsc.com or call 516-622-3900.

Press release is false. All 8 former DA clubs did not join this league. Penn Fusion is one of the best Northeast DA clubs and they rejoined ECNL. Glorified EDP league. You have to live the spin. Girls DA clubs are not banding together to join this league. Around the country the best clubs have joined ECNL already.

I believe this will be a great thing for the girls. Good luck to Meghan and LISC.

What do you expect them to say in a press release? "Development Academy clubs across the country have banded together to establish a new platform...except for the ones that got into ECNL and ECRL"? Penn Fusion wasn't in NE they were Mid-Atlantic, but so was LISC.Fury was in NE and they are not signed onto this new league. I do think that their marketing team should really pay better attention to detail when trying to sell the next "big thing".

That being said, good luck to LISC, they have some good people & players-hope this works out the way they want it to!

Penn Fusion was mid atlantic.

so many clubs and leagues fighting to stay relevant while the fragmentation of the game remains. I am a Peter RR and LISC fan and I know they will make it work but yet again we wont have all the strongest LI players in one place...

I guess you were trying to nit pick to find something false. It is true because penn fusion was not in the northeast.

Anonymous dude or dudet, you are hilarious. Trying to spread misinformation and attack other clubs. You are probably being paid by SUSA just like some other clowns which are trying to use this board in attempt to recruit LISC and EM players and attack the integrity of a club, although not perfect, is trying to build the right way.

The following is an excerpt from today's Soccer Wire article:

"...In addition, the first wave of Girls Academy League members clubs has been revealed, as the Northeast Conference was introduced on Thursday. Eight clubs – all of which are former Girls DA members – comprise the Northeast Conference, representing the states of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey and New York.

The clubs are: Cedar Stars Academy – Bergen, Long Island SC, NEFC, New York SC, Oakwood SC, Seacoast United, South Shore Select and STA. More member clubs announcements are expected to come out from the Girls Academy Club in the coming days and weeks..."

As you can see above the Northeast Conference of the league will comprise eight clubs formerly in DA.The 7 clubs not including LISC were all in the GDA U-15 division this season. LISC is being substituted for FC Fury. So, nice try. The original post/ release is accurate.

Here are the links, if Larry will allow them. If not a quick google search will verify my above statements.


http://www.ussoccerda.com/sam/standings/league/standings.php?leagueId=MTI3Ng%3D%3D

Yes. As I just stated in another post, the press release isn't perfect. However, its accurate in that the other 7 teams in this new conference were in the Northeast GDA U-15s last year with LISC being substituted for Fury.

If they keep their players, it will be a decent league. Probably better than any other options they had.

I wouldn't be surprised to see LISC gain a few players, or at least some will try to join them. The league has 8 very good teams and it sort of has the best of the DA and then took away the worst of the DA, i.e. no HS soccer and subbing rule. LISC has class people and good trainers so I hope it works out for them.

🤞

CJ you are awesome! There are some good quality people still out there who actually care for the kids are appreciate the journey and not what "league" their children play in!

LISC was moved to the NE prior to the GDA announcement. You should not worry about the details if its not for you. Stay where you are at and enjoy your kids path.

Curious as to why that matters? Why should all the top players be on one team? Someone please give me an example of where that takes place... in any sport as well.

i have never understood why people wet their pants over the need to aggregate every "best" player and every "best" club into one league. None of that matters and especially for girls. Having two strong leagues does not detract from anyone's experience. I mean look at the very best womens games you can find, whether it be USWNT or NWSL or even the European leagues. It all sorta is the same brute game and these are the collections of the very best professional players.

Worry about aggregating the very best players in professional academies, thats where the game grows and that is where it matters. And even then, it should happen at around U15 and should NEVER be based on existing teams. It should be a clean slate at that age and thats it. That is when you gather the players and push them forward. Not this bickering over NEFC and World Class girls programs, it has no importance whatsoever and when colleges put a bullet in their soccer programs it will mean even less.

"Worry about aggregating the very best players in professional academies, thats where the game grows and that is where it matters. And even then, it should happen at around U15 and should NEVER be based on existing teams. It should be a clean slate at that age and thats it. That is when you gather the players and push them forward. Not this bickering over NEFC and World Class girls programs, it has no importance whatsoever and when colleges put a bullet in their soccer programs it will mean even less.[/quote]


Here is the problem: IF you are talking about girls, there is no demand to watch a moment of womens soccer other than WC (and Oly) competitions. Consequently, nobody wants to cover the costs of these academies are they are guaranteed money sucks. The MLS teams cant afford to carry the NWSL a la the NBA and WNBA.

I do think this concept is correct for the boys and that is what they are trying to do with the MLS leagues. You allow the MLS to retain the "homegrown designation" of their academy kids, and it makes some sense for them. It's probably better long term for the development of the mens game. It does place an extra onus on the scouts to look at the"late developers" in the tertiary teams. That's what the local friendlies should be for, I guess....

Amen. It matters to the parents so they can gloat on social media. The kids would rather have the most amazing experience for memories. The leagues are just that . A league.

Not the ECNL but a good second option. The ECNL couldn’t take all these teams. Not when some of them were geographically too close to some current ECNL programs. Some girls will leave these teams and find their way to those ECNL clubs. And others who may not get into an ECNL club will have a good second option. But this league should, in the long run, be stronger than any EDP National League.

What age is the new league starting u13?

Can’t wait to hopefully go to LISC heard nothing but great things

It's a great program and Meghan is top-notch. She builds a wonderful rapport with her teams, players and parents!

So very true!!!!

To the LISC fans take it easy. They are like any other org (SUSA, Ably, EM etc) The girls play hard and coaching is like any other org. They are just a flow through for talent - each year hoping the best talents lands with them and training them just like any org would - nothing special. yet they will charge like crazy and people keep paying because they think there kids will play in a D1 school with a full scholarship. A new incarnation of the Rough Riders and same complaint you hear for years. Will this Girls Academy work with the legitimacy of US Soccer or a branding trick to keep going another year in a saturated market?

You have no idea what you are talking about. But I am sure it makes you feel good to put others down.